The History of Open Source Culture and One Developer's Coming Out Journey

Copyright Linux International 2017
1 of 29
The History of Free And Open
Source Culture: A Personal Story
by
Jon "maddog" Hall
Executive Director
Linux International
and
Board Chair, LPI
and
President, Project Cauã
and
Senior Advisor, Caninos Loucos

2 of 29
Warning:
Strong opinions in this talk....many are personal and
apply only to me...your opinions may vary....I
respect yours, please respect mine.

3 of 29
Who Am I?
Half Electrical Engineer, Half Business, Half Computer Software
In the computer industry since 1969
Mainframes 5 years
Unix since 1980
Linux since 1994
Companies (mostly large): Aetna Life and Casualty, Bell Labs, Digital Equipment
Corporation, SGI, IBM, Linaro, LeMaker
Programmer, Systems Administrator, Systems Engineer, Product Manager, Technical
Marketing Manager, University Educator, Author, Businessperson, Consultant
Taught OS design and compiler design
Extremely large systems to extremely small ones
Vendor and a customer
Pragmatic

4 of 29
In 1830s.....
Age of steam and power
Charles Babbage
Trained at Cambridge
Analytical Engine
Difference Engine

5 of 29
We Do Not Care About
Charles...
Lady Lovelace:
Daughter of Lord Byron
Mathmatical Genious
Wrote first “programs”
for Analytical Engine
Considered “first
programmer”
“Ada” named for her

6 of 29
1935 - Cambridge
Brilliant young mathematician
Interested in how humans think
Wrote book on artificial computing
“Turing Machine” and “AI”
1940 – Broke Enigma Code with BOMBA
Saved ~14,000,000 lives
1952 – Indicted for “homosexual acts”
1954 – Committed suicide

7 of 29
Harvard – Mark I
Commander Howard Aiken –
Project Leader
Built on Babbage's theories

8 of 29
We Do Not Care About
Howard...
Grace Murray Hopper:
Lt. who rose to Rear Admiral
First Modern Day Programmer
“Amazing Grace”
Programmed for ballistics
Project Leader for COBOL
“nano-seconds and more....”

9 of 29
1969
Unix was invented at Bell Laboratories
Ken Thompson and Dennis Ritchie
Arpanet was funded
Linus Torvalds was born in Helsinki
Finland
Stonewall riots in New York City
maddog attended Drexel University
The last time maddog shaved....

10 of 29
The Last Time maddog Shaved

11 of 29
Computers in 1969
Physically large
Logically small
REALLY Expensive!
Slow by today's standards
One program at a time
No Operating System
Link device drivers into program
Boot program

12 of 29
….But Also Mini-Computers!
DEC PDP-8
4 Kilobytes RAM
One General Purpose
Register
Lights and Buttons!
DECUS
Libraries of Code!
(Almost) Free!

13 of 29
DECUS
Few “Professional Programmers”
Too few computers of one type or one OS
People wrote programs to solve own problems
People gave away their programs to DECUS
Others cooperated in making programs better
“Let me buy you a beer...let me give you a job.”
Communities of people making their own (and
other's) lives better

14 of 29
University of California:
Berkeley
Ken Thompson (co-inventor of Unix OS) went on
sabbatical
Used Unix to teach Operating System Courses
BSD Unix derived from AT&T (Bell Laboratories)
Unix
Unix “flavored” by Berkeley environment
spell(1) - “dyke” vs “dike”, “fag”
fortune(1)
Eventually BSD Unix became “Open Source”

15 of 29
USENIX:
Software Tools
Organization for design of modern operating
systems
Many based on Unix
Shared programs and data openly
Special Interest Groups included “Birds of Feather”
sessions on LGBT participants
Many leaders of DECUS were LGBT
Copyright, Patents and Proprietary versions
eliminated open sharing

16 of 29
GNU Is Not UNIX:
The Beginning of the FSF
Richard M. Stallman (rms) loved looking at source
code in 1984
Distressed because he could no longer solve his own
problems
Decided to write his own “Unix-like” operating
system called “GNU” (for GNU is Not UNIX)
In 1995 formed the Free Software Foundation
(FSF)

17 of 29
DECUS – May 1994
The Adult Disneyland
Held in New Orleans
Linus Torvalds (creator of Linux
kernel) invited to speak
Demonstration of (GNU) Linux
GNU “OS, Linux kernel, and many
more pieces of code
Arranged to donate Alpha processor
to Linux port
Enjoyed the rest of New Orleans

18 of 29
Became (more) Involved With
Free and Open Source
Community
“meritocracy”
“show me the code”
“On the Internet, no one
knows you are a dog”
“diversity is good”

19 of 29
The Computer Industry
Tended to be “tolerant”
They cared more about results than sexuality
IBM
Digital Equipment Corporation
Sun Microsystems
Microsoft
Google
Hewlett Packard
Apple
Others....

20 of 29
Started To Travel Internationally
International travel more than 50% of my time
Over 100 countries, most more than one time
For the people on the street, mostly the same:
A good life for themselves
A better life for their children
To be left alone by the government

21 of 29
At The Age of 60, Still In Closet
Sex is a continuum:
Very homosexual
Bi-sexual
Very heterosexual
Sex drive is a continuum
Very high sex drive
“Normal” sex drive
Low sex drive
I am very homosexual, low sex drive

22 of 29
Marriage Equality Struggle
Erupted in USA
Friends of mine, living together for forty or fifty
years, were dying protection and recognition of
marriage
Exposed strong bigots
Joined Marriage Equality fight
Donated money
Manned phone banks
Protested for Marriage Equality
Attended Legislature Meetings
New Hampshire Legislature voted for Marriage
Equality

23 of 29
“I Do Not Understand”
My Catholic friend of many years did not
understand why “Civil Unions” were not enough.
Twenty minutes of quiet conversation convinced
him.

24 of 29
Quiet One on One Talk Was Not
Enough
“Gay Geeks” had double whammy:
Being Geeks
Being Homosexual
Young LGBTQ people were committing suicide at
heavy rate
State controls on marriage equality needed to
become nation-wide

25 of 29
I Came Out:
June 12
th
, 2012
Wrote long blog article
On July 4
th
, 2012 I answered commenters
http://www.linuxpromagazine.com/Online/Blogs/Pa
w-Prints-Writings-of-the-maddog/In-Honor-of-
Alan-Turing-A-message-from-the-sponsor-
UPDATED-for-Independence-Day
Over 100,000 readers in 100 countries, five
languages
It remains the “most read blog” of any article or
blog written for Linux Magazine

26 of 29
Fall Out
Overwhelming support from readers
Many people have come up and thanked me
Many others have made the decision to “come out”
Freedom of “no more secrets”
I found a boyfriend in 2014
On February 28
th
, 2017 we were married

27 of 29
In Summary
I am still a Geek
That is a choice
I still believe in Free and Open Source Software
That is a given
My sexuality is a small, but important part of my
life
That is not a choice
I love my husband
That is also a given

28 of 29
Recommendations
Be yourself
Be true to yourself
Live by example
Learn the arguments, learn the answers
Speak quietly and clearly
Find your love before you are sixty-one

29 of 29
Questions or Comments?

The History of Open Source Culture and One Developer's Coming Out Journey

Recommended

Recommended

More Related Content

Similar to The History of Open Source Culture and One Developer's Coming Out Journey

Similar to The History of Open Source Culture and One Developer's Coming Out Journey (20)

More from UNICORNS IN TECH

More from UNICORNS IN TECH (20)

Recently uploaded

Recently uploaded (20)

The History of Open Source Culture and One Developer's Coming Out Journey